The latest exhibition to open at Whitechapel Gallery explores the experimental work of visionary French filmmaker Chris Marker. Changing his name and declining to be photographed of interviewed Marker was a true enigma, crafting vivid film essays that inject realism with science fiction and lace lyricism with politics.

His influence blotted art, experimental film and mainstream cinema alike: the 1962 work La Jetée formed the foundation for Terry Gilliam’s 1995 Twelve Monkeys – with the Hollywood additions of a Brad Pitt here and a Bruce Willis there. Here, Habda Rashid, Assistant Curator at Whitechapel Gallery takes us behind a lifetime of work to a place where film transcends geography to shift sleekly in and out of the metaphysical.

Tempe Nakiska: Chris Marker put together over 60 films in his time. How did you approach curating such a large body of work?
Habda Rashid: Chris Marker: A Grin Without a Cat is a thematic exhibition, bringing together Marker’s films, photography, installations and archives and placing works from different media and periods in relation to each other. We decided to include seven important Chris Marker films which relate to the four key themes we investigate in the show. A film and events programme at the Whitechapel Gallery will also expand on the exhibition, and we’re collaborating with the Barbican and Institut français on a special season of screenings which will run from until June.

TN: What was the aim of expression in terms of what you wanted to communicate with the retrospective?
HR: We wanted to show the public how prolific and broad Chris Marker’s career was and showcase him and his exceptional work beyond film. The exhibition catalogue we’re producing, for example, includes a selection of Marker’s writings, including a brilliantly dark short story he wrote in the 1950s, which is being published in English for the first time.

TN: What are the key pieces shown in the exhibition?
HR: There are many highlights in this exhibition, and we are presenting a lot of ‘firsts’. The show ends with one of Marker’s most political films, Le fond de l’air est rouge (1977) which was reedited and released as A Grin without a Cat in 1993, it will be the world premiere of a newly re-mastered version of the film. We are particularly pleased to bring together all five of Chris Marker’s multi-media installations for the first time in the exhibition, including the UK premiere of the multi-media installation Zapping Zone (Proposal for an Imaginary Television, 1990-94). There are lots of treasures in the show for those who are new to Marker and for those who are more familiar with his work.

Chris Marker ‘La Jetée’ (1962) Film Still Image courtesy BFI Stills Collection © 1963 Argos Films

TN: Which of Marker’s key themes do you approach with the exhibition?
HR: The exhibition unfolds in four key themes that recur throughout Marker’s work – the Museum, Travelogues, Film and Memory, and War and Revolution. Pivotal films are shown in relation to rarely exhibited photographs, book-works, collages, and multimedia installations.

TN: Marker’s cultural references are many and varied, even within the same film. How did he manage to keep a feeling of continuity across such disparate themes?
HR: In researching the show we’ve discovered a lot about how Marker worked. He reused and revisited his imagery constantly, and when you read his writing it is almost like a prelude to his filmmaking, he saw a strong connection between the written word and film. There is a strong ‘style’ running through Marker’s complete practice. It would be good fun to chart a genealogy of some of the pieces, for example you will see photographs that suddenly appear in films or on the front cover of one of the Petite Planète series of books Marker worked on.

TN: There are darker concepts explored here, too. How do these themes reflect on Marker’s own life and attitude towards the cultural events he was impacted on by?
HR: Marker joined the French resistance, he was part of a generation that witnessed unbelievable atrocities and like many this marked him. After WWII, we saw a flood of visions of the future, the questioning of old values and a sense of regret for what had happened. With this came a time of considerable upheaval in the world, Marker was an insatiable traveller and a political activist – so both a participant and chronicler of the struggles that were taking place.

Another interesting development over the later half of the twentieth century was with technology, and Marker was at the forefront of this. He used the Cinéma vérité technique in Le Joli Mai (1962), he shifted to multi-media and digital. This shift in technology aided his exploration of how we comment, represent and even change society.

Chris Marker: A Grin Without A Cat runs until 22nd June at Whitechapel Gallery, 77-82 Whitechapel High St, London E1 7QX

Together with Whitechapel Gallery and Institut français, Barbican presents the retrospective film series, Chris Marker: Memories Of A Film Pioneer, until 14th May. View the schedule here.